Saturday July 28
The 39 Steps
(Alfred Hitchcock, 1935)
1.15pm, BBC2
This classic boy's own adventure rattles along at a furious pace. Robert Donat is suitably confused as innocent murder suspect Richard Hannay, chased by the police from London to the Scottish Highlands and back while himself tracking dastardly spies and dallying with Madeleine Carroll; and all the time old whatsisname, the Memory Man, holds the key to the mystery ... enormous fun. More Hitch thrills with The Lady Vanishes at 2.40pm, and Young And Innocent tomorrow morning.
84 Charing Cross Road
(David Jones, 1987)
3.45pm, Five
The true story of a spiky New York writer and an antiquarian bookseller whose literary correspondence develops into a warm relationship, though they never meet. Anne Bancroft plays Helene Hanff, who wrote a book about the wistful postwar affair of mind and heart; and Anthony Hopkins is the bookseller, Frank Doel: both far too good to fall into brash American/diffident Englishman stereotypes.
Jaws
(Steven Spielberg, 1975)
8.45pm, ITV1
It's the heavy-bass John Williams score that instils the menace of the great white shark, feasting on holidaymakers in this terror-classic. Canny Spielberg keeps the fish mainly out of sight, a horror lurking on the edge of consciousness, until in the explosive denouement it is revealed as... a pretty risible pair of rubber gnashers.
Rat Race
(Jerry Zucker, 2001)
9.05pm, C4
John Cleese's ridiculous Las Vegas casino owner sets half-a-dozen fruit-machine players on a race hundreds of miles to a New Mexico railway station where $2m is stashed in a locker: the winner gets the cash. Meanwhile Cleese and his high-roller chums sit back and make big bets on the outcome. A simple-minded, enjoyable comedy in the spirit of It's A Mad Mad Mad Mad World.
Dirty Pretty Things
(Stephen Frears, 2002)
10.45pm, BBC2
A sympathetic and sensitive depiction of what life is like for illegal immigrants scratching a living in a downbeat, backstreet London. Chiwetel Ejiofor is quietly charismatic as the Nigerian Okwe, slogging away as a taxi driver and hotel night porter; Audrey "Amélie" Tautou is a Turkish asylum-seeker working as a cleaner.
Daredevil
(Mark Steven Johnson, 2003)
10.50pm, BBC1
Matt Murdock, blinded as a child in an accident involving radioactive stuff, grows up to be an honest New York lawyer by day and a radar-guided, red leather-clad crime-fighter by night. Yup, it's another anguished Marvel superhero, and Ben Affleck makes a decent enough job of him. There are more colourful turns from Michael Clarke Duncan and wild-eyed Colin Farrell as villains Kingpin and Bullseye, and Jennifer Garner as Elektra, but it never quite swings like Spider-Man.
The Parole Officer
(John Duigan, 2001)
11.10pm, C4
Steve Coogan, in his first feature film, and co-writer Henry Normal come up with an Ealingesque tale in which Coogan's good-natured probation officer is framed for a gangland murder by bent cop Stephen Dillane, and has to persuade three of his former cons (Om Puri, Steven Waddington, Ben Miller) to leave the straight-and-narrow and help him steal a tape that proves his innocence.
Gumshoe
(Stephen Frears, 1971)
12.15am, BBC2
Frears' debut feature, a delightful, funny homage to film noir with a touch of Billy Liar thrown in for good measure. Albert Finney is marvellous as Liverpool bingo caller Eddie Ginley, who imagines himself a Bogartesque private eye and becomes embroiled in a real murder case.
Sunday July 29
The Parent Trap
(David Swift, 1961)
12.05pm, ITV1
Hayley Mills stars in this original Disney version of the family comedy which was charmingly updated by Nancy Meyer. Young Hayley plays separated twins who are reunited by chance and overcome their hate-at-first-sight to bring parents Brian Keith and Maureen O'Hara back together. Good wholesome fun.
Dick Tracy
(Warren Beatty, 1990)
5.20pm, Five
Beatty's version of square-jawed Dick Tracy is firmly rooted in the detective's comic-strip origins. He creates a 1930s mobsterland of gleaming night-time city streets and livid costumery, while the bad guys are obscured under heaps of grotesque make-up. Beatty, as Tracy, is impeccable in bright yellow overcoat; Al Pacino is Richard III-like as crimelord Big Boy Caprice, Dustin Hoffman is furtive supergrass "Mumbles", and taking the biscuit is Madonna as nightclub floozy Breathless Mahoney.
Charlie's Angels
(McG, 2000)
8pm, Five
Pop-video maker McG's big screen version of the 1970s TV series is pure popcorn movie. The plot, for what it's worth, has the Angels - Drew Barrymore, Cameron Diaz and Lucy Liu - on the case of pantomime villain Tim Curry and henchman Crispin Glover, who have stolen some Very Important software for something-or-other: it doesn't really matter, it's just an excuse for the girls to romp through the high-kicking routines.
From Russia With Love
(Terence Young, 1963)
9pm, BBC2
With the reissued Goldfinger in the cinemas, here's an even earlier Bond adventure. Sean Connery's 007 is reliably smooth and sardonic, with Gypsy girls fighting over him in Istanbul and being stalked by Robert Shaw's implacable Soviet assassin: there is a bruising final confrontation on the Orient Express. For a Bond babe, Daniela Bianchi is rather touching, a Russian intelligence clerk hoping to escape to the west, but way out of her depth.
The 51st State
(Ronny Yu, 2001)
10pm, C4
Samuel L Jackson plays Californian chemist Elmo McElroy who's in Liverpool, in a kilt, with samples of his hugely mood-enhancing new recreational drug to make a deal with crimelord Ricky Tomlinson. Elmo's guide is Robert Carlyle's Felix, whose ex (Emily Mortimer's Dakota) is a hitwoman out to kill them. It's hardly original, but Yu keeps it moving fast and mildly amusing.
The Noose
(Edmond T Gréville, 1948)
12.15am, BBC2
There's a vicious streak to this impressive, striking-looking British thriller. It's set in black-marketeering Soho, where the thoroughly nasty crimeboss Joseph Calleia rules with a knuckledustered fist and the help of cockney crook Nigel Patrick.
Monday July 30
48 Hrs
(Walter Hill, 1982)
11pm, ITV1
A frenetic, funny tale of a mismatched duo: bad-tempered cop Nick Nolte and, making an inspired debut, Eddie Murphy as a gabby con on 48 hours' leave from the slammer. They are hunting an exceptionally nasty pair of villains through the deadly streets of San Francisco, but spend as much time cursing and thumping each other as the bad guys.
The Big Red One
(Samuel Fuller, 1980)
11.25pm, BBC1
Fuller's tribute to his second world war comrades in the US army follows a platoon of the First Infantry Division through combat in North Africa and Europe, from the D-day landings to the liberation of the concentration camps. It's full of gutsy action, courage and fear.
Tuesday July 31
Two Weeks Notice
(Marc Lawrence, 2002)
9pm, ITV1
Sandra Bullock is a ditzy environmentalist lawyer; Hugh Grant a wealthy, self-centred property developer. This being romcom world, she agrees to work for him, quickly becomes irreplaceable, then gives him two weeks' notice that she's quitting. Will they get past the superficial annoyance and admit their true, feelings for each other? Nah, not a chance. Is there?
Keeping The Faith
(Edward Norton, 2000)
11.20pm, BBC1
Norton's debut as director is a pleasing romantic comedy. He plays Brian, a Catholic priest; his best friend Jake (Ben Stiller) is a rabbi, and they're both in love with their former childhood chum turned corporate troubleshooter, Anna (Jenna Elfman). It grows a little over-earnest, but the leads are all engaging.
The Ipcress File
(Sidney J Furie, 1965)
11.20pm, BBC2
Michael Caine's speccy intelligence man Harry Palmer underplayed the Bond heroics but set a new standard of 1960s cool (eat your heart out, Austin Powers). In this slick, gripping version of the Len Deighton novel he investigates a scientific brain drain, and discovers one of his bosses is a double agent. More Caine action at 1.05am with Pulp.
Wednesday Aug 1
Odd Man Out
(Carol Reed, 1947)
11.35am, BBC2
James Mason plays one of Carol Reed's displaced heroes, the doomed IRA gun-runner Johnny McQueen. Badly wounded in a stick-up gone wrong, he searches out true love Kathleen Ryan and his only friend, Robert Beatty, as the police net inexorably draws in. An involving, moody drama.
Hudson Hawk
(Michael Lehmann, 1991)
9pm, Five
Wobbly big-budget adventure yarn that pitches Bruce Willis back to his fast-quipping Moonlighting persona. He's a cat burglar contracted to steal Leonardo da Vinci works that hold clues to the old lead-into-gold alchemists' puzzle (shades of The Da Vinci Code). With Danny Aiello, Richard E Grant, Sandra Bernhard and Andie MacDowell.
Hell Drivers
(Cy Endfield, 1957)
11.50pm, BBC2
British screen toughie Stanley Baker is excellent in this solid, gritty thriller. He plays an ex-jailbird signing up with a dodgy haulage firm where Patrick McGoohan is the corrupt foreman. The drivers have to make like Lewis Hamilton to collect their bonuses.
Thursday Aug 2
Following
(Christopher Nolan, 1998)
12.05am, BBC2
This low-budget, black-and-white first feature from the director of Memento and The Prestige is likewise a discombobulating tale that plays merry hell with the gap between appearance and reality. It has struggling novelist Jeremy Theobald falling in with a burglar (Alex Haw) who says he can read his victim's psyche through the possessions he steals.
Friday Aug 3
Ace Ventura: Pet Detective
(Tom Shadyac, 1994)<br. 10.35pm, BBC1
Jim Carrey whizzed into the superstar league as the dumb gumshoe, a dab hand at tracking missing beasts and impersonating Connery's Bond. He's on the case of the Miami Dolphins' missing mascot, a live dolphin. Sean Young growls at the sleuth, Courteney Cox purrs.
